THE VALLEY, Anguilla, CMC – Former home affairs minister Walcott Richardson is due to re-appear in court on May 10 on two charges of indecent assault.
Richardson, who resigned from the Hubert Hughes administration last month, has been granted EC$110,000 (One EC dollar = US$0.37 cents) bail.
In announcing his resignation last month, Richardson said he felt “in the current circumstances it is right for me to tender my resignation as Minister of Home Affairs at this time” while he defended his reputation against the allegations.
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PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Former academic and legislator, Professor John Spence has died. He was 83.
Relatives said that he died of a heart attack late Wednesday.
Spence was a Professor of Botany and also Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture at the St. Augustine campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI) and served as an Independent Senator from 1987 to 2000. He was also awarded the Chaconia Medal Gold in 1980.
NEW YORK, CMC – Secretary of the United States’ Homeland Security Department, Janet Napolitano, has warned passengers at John F. Kennedy International Airport to schedule extra hours for travel as the department faces a 5 percent cut in the US federal budget battle.
Napolitano told reporters that while passengers at New York’s airports are yet feel the impact of spending cuts that went into effect on Friday, security lines at airports in other cities, including Los Angeles and Chicago, were already twice as long .
KINGSTON, Jamaica, CMC - The United States-based rating agency, Moody’s Investor Services has cut Jamaica's sovereign foreign currency credit rating to Caa3 from B3, citing the recent domestic debt exchange as a distressed event that still leaves the country with a high debt burden. Last month, Jamaica launched a National Debt Exchange (NDX) to alleviate the financing pressures of its sizeable debt load.
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - Both houses of the Barbados Parliament have been constituted and the Throne Speech has been delivered as the new administration sits down to begin its business in what is going to be an interesting period of our parliamentary life. One aspect of being a responsible paper is that we function as a paper of record; for in future generations researchers and others will no doubt draw upon our pages to ascertain what happened in our times and to read about our views and attitudes to those events which occurred at that time.
ST JOHN’S, Antigua – A regional expert on earthquakes said residents should not fear the natural happening, but rather, prepare for its inevitable arrival.
Following the revelation that two minor earthquakes hit near to Antigua & Barbuda in the last two days, Director of the Seismic Research Centre at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad, Dr Joan Latchman, said residents should not be alarmed because Antigua & Barbuda has always exhibited a “high level” of activity.
ST JOHN’S, Antigua – Pungent fumes drifting over Antigua from Montserrat’s volcano sparked alarm yesterday, prompting disaster chiefs to issue a health alert. The National Office of Disaster Services (NODS) told OBSERVER media that staff had received a number of calls from concerned members of the public complaining about a stench of sulphur. Director Philmore Mullin said a change in wind had blown gases from the Soufriere Hills volcano over to the island.
HAMILTON, Bermuda, CMC - Bermuda's MPs have passed a resolution giving cabinet ministers a 10 per cent pay cut effective April 1.
“It’s more symbolic than substantive,” Premier Craig Cannonier said, noting that the overall saving was relatively small. “But in our present economic and fiscal circumstances, it’s the right thing moving forward.”
The Premier’s salary will decrease from US$168,069 to US$151,262 a year, while the Deputy Premier’s pay goes from US$125,491 to US$112,942.
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad - Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar will be in Venezuela today to attend the funeral of president Hugo Chavez. Persad-Bissessar left Trinidad at 4.30 p.m. yesterday for Caracas and is scheduled to return home later today. Chavez's funeral is scheduled to take place at 10 a.m. today.
CARACAS -- Hundreds of thousands of President Hugo Chávez’s followers waited hours in a three-mile-long line Thursday to file past the late leader’s coffin as Cuban leader Raúl Castro and other presidents arrived to attend Friday’s state funeral.
Castro’s unexpected arrival in the early afternoon at the Simon Bolivar International Airport was broadcast live by the official Venezuelan television network VTV. He was greeted by Foreign Minister ElĂas Jaua and a small military honor guard, but did not make public comments.